New concerns about Village Post Offices

Thanks to the Rural Blog (a service of Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues at the University of Kentucky), I learned of a Reuters story that may be of interest to local readers.

“The financially troubled U.S. Postal Service has determined that its plan to replace money-losing offices with retailers contracted to offer basic services will not work in many rural communities,” the Reuters story begins.

This report focuses on rural communities west of the Mississippi River. According to the story, USPS plans to open 2,000 Village Post Offices (a retail operation housed within an existing business), although that may changing.

We know that the Bradfordsville Post Office was identified as a branch that could be closed in the near future, and if you've followed the events, you know that the citizens of Bradfordsville are strongly in favor of keeping their branch open.

Postal officials have presented the Village Post Office idea as a possible compromise for Bradfordsville residents.

Ruth Goldway, the chairwoman of the Postal Regulatory Committee, is quoted by Reuters as saying the postal service has had some problems finding businesses to operate the Village Post Offices.

"In practice, they haven't been able to sign up that many Village Post Offices, and they are discovering that in these rural areas they've identified there aren't necessarily other businesses that would take on the rural post office,” she said. “It's not going to be their great solution to the problem."

The postal service is clearly facing some serious financial difficulties, but it looks like solving those problems could require another change of plans.